DUP agree simple deal for Government

So, time to reflect on the DUP-Tory negotiations.


Much harder this time round than 2010 when Clegg and Cameron were clearly such bossom buddies (with hindsight, easily could have swapped roles with one another, so close were they politically).


This time the DUP sensed their chance against a weakened Prime Minister and came up with a very long list of demands, for a party that is not strictly needed to keep the Government in power.


This then drew 2 weeks of avid criticism of May (remember, I was not a fan originally and have sadly seen my view of her come to pass) and her inability to negotiate even this.


The first rule of negotiation though, is to negotiate, to stay at the table. Not to strop off like a child or say 'no deal' like the yanks do all the time. This achieves little. What actually works is patiently sitting there, hearing the otherside out, whilst making it clear you can't give them much but still want a deal.


This takes time, in this case 2 weeks, eventually if your position is sound and a deal makes sense for both parties, then it is done on reasonable terms. Even when one side started out with a hard bargaining position.


So to today, where the DUP have won basically a tiny pork barrel and concession of some policies the Tory's did not want to implement anyway (again, good negotiation tactic to offer the easy giveaways up).


So on balance I would give this deal a good 7/10 - the main drawback being the awkward handling a the beginning causing a longer delay than necessary - but the right answer in the end.


It does not bode too badly for Brexit then, not that you will read that in the mainstream media currently.

Why no love for the coalition?

The coalition came into power during the worst recession that has ever happened. It inherited finances from a government who had spent more than all the previous post war governments put together.
The banks were still tottering.The high streets deserted and job losses and inflation increasing. 

Then the Euro zone started to collapse. The UK's largest trading partners could hide their recession no longer and they began to falter leading to the humiliating need to bail out entire countries.
And if that wasn't enough North Africa and the Middle East went into revolution and Scotland decided it wanted a divorce.

Any one of these events might have sunk a normal administration. All of them at once should have defeated the coalition utterly.
When Jim Callaghan, faced with 1976 inflation and falling output from the factories was asked in cabinet what should they do, he suggested, only half jokingly, that they all emigrate.

Yet the coalition has been a success.
The inflation specter loomed only briefly. The rise of unemployment was halted well below the 4 million expectation. Borrowing, while desperate, was no worse than other nations. Civil unrest, after a flurry at the start, has been normal for Britain. The 'cuts' have been implemented and even some tax cuts have been made. And a very radical manifesto of benefits changes, education changes, dubious NHS changes, tuition changes and now pension changes implemented. More than labour attempted in 13 years never mind 4.

Yet the coalition is very unpopular. Its unpopular here on this blog. I am unimpressed. CU has even gone over to UKIP.

 Why is this so? What more could we realistically have expected them to do?

I suspect that in the future, history will look more kindly on this period than we do today.

Something missing in the coalition

Something has been very wrong with the coalition from early on. It isn't very good. At lots of things. But it isn't very good at politics. Which is odd because that is its job.

One of the great things about the defeat of labour in May 2010 was the almost instant cessation of the babble of political non-news. A silence filled the airwaves. No one was in charge. So nothing much happened except hacks standing outside Number 10 watching a man hide behind a closed door.
For 13 years a constant stream of propaganda had poured out of the airwaves. Cabinet ministers had droned the exact same, word for word, media grid message as each other like boring Stepford wives. Non entity backbenchers would attend the opening of a door if a Spad could get them a photo in the local paper.  If there was a crisis a minister would appear on TV, explaining what had not just occurred and assuring everyone that it was all the fault of the opposition, and that X billion pound would be immediately spent and then list 10 other things that they would do or had done that had no relevance.
And if there was no crisis a minister would appear on television with a planted non-news story or just repeat the exact same thing they had said the week before but pretend it was new.

It was incredibly annoying. But for a very long time, very effective. The New labour spin machine usually held the political high ground for the first 8 years or so. That was because it was totally orchestrated, totally managed. It was a Godfather organisation that had the power to demand service and reward loyalty and whack those who didn't recognise an offer they shouldn't refuse.
And run by some incredibly talented,evil geniuses.

Cameron lost his Luca Brasi very early on. And took years to find another.
If he had had a 'Campbell' we could expect the bedroom tax to have never left the think tank. 
Its not a bad idea. It does , on paper, save money. And it does drive the personal responsibility narrative, make work pay ideals, of IDS.

 But its political death. It ticks every anti-liberal box. It can be viewed as falling exclusively on the poorest and most vulnerable. It can't be properly implemented as housing is not in sufficient supply.
It disproportionately affects the disabled.
Someone should have told Frank Pentangeli IDS it wasn't happening. He could have bellowed and threatened all he liked. But at the end of the day he would have been told to run with benefits cap and universal credit and not the spare bedroom subsidy.

"Its bad for business Ian. Its got Poll Tax stink. So leave the gun. Take the cannoli."

Foreign aid. Perfectly laudable. The appropriate thing for a first world nation to do. Provide medicine and education around the world.  Grease a few commerce wheels. Trade a few £mil favours. Maybe you can do something in return for us, someday? Hey! you like Jet fighters?" And in government terms its small change down the sofa. 
0.7% of spending. Imagine you had to shave 0.7% off your annual food bill.. Wouldn't be hard.
And the Guardian absolutely loved the idea of ring fencing foreign aid,

But foreign aid is toxic. Its toxic because the ordinary voter in the Starbucks hears £11 billion pounds and thinks that must be the size of the total NHS budget or the cost of defence.  And.. IT IS  a big number. 
Its a similar number as the temporary VAT increase from 17.5 to 20% that is never going to go away. We gave ourselves a tax rise to fund the Indian space program? 
Cameron should have said "in these difficult times and during this difficult period, the government is going to spend 2/3 of this parliament's 'foreign aid' in our own country!" and take the hit from the liberals.
 And if Cameron wanted to or had to pay out the overseas money, nick it from somewhere else and call it something difference. 'Don' Tony would have, without a second thought. 'Capo' Gordon would have suggested it to him.
"Peter? There is a problem I need you to take care of. "

The flooding. The initial response had been fine. Really it had. 40 homes in Somerset flooded. Well that's bad but not even unusual in February. What was bad was the crisis continued to grow. The land stayed flooded. And a response team took a very long time to form. No one was actually banging the government's drum until it was too late. 

The evil genius team would have seen the opportunity for some minister for agriculture to get down there and blow on about how many £million had been spent since 1997 and how much extra £x million was being spent and the local party mobilised to do soup kitchens and food aid and a £1k cheque written for the sea scouts as they floated to help. 
 Gordon Brown used to look for any excuse to call a Cobra meeting.

Why didn't team Cameron see this coming and get ready? Why weren't there any sandbags actually in place or in a likely place with clear instructions and advice being pumped out by the relevant agency 24/7 until the water was starting to float up towards Whitehall? Behind the curve. Behind events with an unsure response of reassurance, blame and panic. That's a very bad place to be.

New labour would not have remained behind events. 
Why, after almost four years, is the coalition?
Their business is politics. They don't HAVE to get it right all the time. But they do have to make us think they have or very soon will get it right. 

Obama has declared a state of emergency in some states in America yesterday due to snow. Looking very' Pres' as he does it. Listing all the agencies who are doing something or other. Its what he does. Its what his job is. He isn't going to be filmed shoveling snow off the roads. He's going to be filmed looking like someone who is damned well sure he's going to get some other people to shovel snow off the roads.

That's his job.

Reshuffle {2} Who's not fit for purpose?

Not many people fancied Ken Clarke for chancellor on the last reshuffle post. But even fewer wanted George Osborne to continue. So Ken gets the job.

With reader apathy in play about what useless politician should get what non job, we'll skip on down past the list of ministers for nooks,crannies and corners. Ministers for Country and /or Western, etc, straight to the important ones.

Home Secretary Theresa May has not done well. She started brightly. Promised to cut police red tape. To make flabby cops get out from the admin block and onto the beat. Inflict tougher sentencing for menaces whilst in possession of a hoodie. It all came undone quite quickly.

The 'Tough on Crime' platitudes sounded a lot less convincing 15 years since they were first expertly, but insincerely, announced. Before long the ECHR and their poster boy, Abu Qatada, was making the UK look foolish. Mrs May looked particularly weak and  incompetent when her department didn't know what day of the week it was. Soon she had the immigration head in tears and arrivals desks with queues stretching all the way to the original departure country. Illegals absconding. Student disorder. Uncontrolled rioting. Full prisons and all the usual Home Office 'not fit for purpose' failures.

Mrs May has not fought her corner well. Shocked as I was to discover the super generous rates of pay and incredible pension deals of the police force, it is still an Olympic year. There had been the worst riots in 30 years. Public order protests are on the rise. Not just the usual tambourine band, free Pinnochet save the eels types. Serious, union backed and organised marches. All poised to disrupt the nation. And there have been a new band of 'Swampy' old style, hippy, campus sit ins.

Yet the police had to take a substantial, and wholly unwelcome hit from the public spending cuts. They did not react well. Theresa seemed unable to convince them that it was in their own interests. That if every copper got a £80,000 pension for 40+ years, police costs rise above budget, it would leave no police to police. Our police force would be a retired one.

Elected chiefs. Changes to hours. Changes to rest periods and a monotonous and largely disbelieved refrain from the home office that these cuts should have no impact on front line policing.

As in every public sector organisation, the bosses decide where the cuts come from, not the minister.

Certainly no cuts to the Chief constables Range Rovers. Not the all important diversity and equality unit. Not to the fishing teaches patience training days. But to somewhere where it hurts. Why she ever imagined it would be any different in the police as opposed to a district council is a mystery.

Now, the police really should have to trim their budgets. Should be made to face up to the pension reality that has been ignored by all parties for 40 years. But they should have had some leniency. Some capping of their cuts. Same with the border force. If you want people to present a shining example of a modern democracy to millions of Olympic tourists, its probably best not to axe jobs, take pensions and raise retirement ages first.

Anyway.. with cuddly Ken in the treasury, who could take her place?
Another woman would be politically preferable. The last two having not performed so well, the ladies now need a big success for the feminist cause. But a look at the current cabinet shows just five women. Four of whom { Sayeeda Warsi, Caroline Spelman, Cheryl Gillan, Theresa May} will be very lucky to keep their jobs in a reshuffle. And if they do will only be because it would bring up the misogynist Dave tag again if he knifed all his babes.

So that leaves neophyte, but capable, Justine Greening. Currently at transport following Phil Hammond's promotion after the Fox affair she was formerly a junior at the treasury. It would be a huge, huge promotion.

Well...she can't do any worse than May or Smith, can she?

Coalition Government failing on the economics of simplicty

I missed my chance to get really upset at the Coalition yesterday with its idiotic new housing policy. Still finding myself angry today (a long conversation with Bill Quango MP not helping at all with calming me down), I feel compelled to write; although I shall resist the urge to post this in green for effect.

Grant Shapps, one of the Government's brighter minds generally, found himself yesterday trying to defend the latest subsidy to housebuilders and Middle England. 95% mortgages are to be made available to help Wimpey sell more homes.

Now of course we need more homes - this is easy to see, prices are astronomical as demand outsrips supply in many areas. So nothing wrong with creating market incentives to remedy this. Only now the Government has desided to buy into high risk of mortgage loans - higher than the market thinks sensible. I recall in the financial bubble there were companies offering these sorts of rates and higher, Northern Rock, HBOS, Bradford and Bingley - I wonder what happened to them in the dim and distant past of just a few years ago. Oh yes, they all went tits up when the market fell. Markets rise and fall, in the long-term we have a housing shortage - but markets can be irrational and rising rates in the near future are unlikely to be allied with a big jump in house prices. Moreover, the short-term boost to prices of this policy could well lead to a spike in new build prices, then with no subsidy for on-sell a baked in negative equity position for buyers. The risk here is a Government creating negative equity and then being forced into enforcing on people it has lent to - a PR disaster in the making!
Not only is there this risk, but this policy means the Government has to work with lends, housebuilders and sundry advisers to get this daft idea going - all of which is time consuming and expensive.

When, but of course, there are far simpler tools available. Rather than lend more money, the Government could exclude new builds from stamp duty. This would lower the funds needed for a deposit and has the ease of use of already having been in place recently as a policy for properties up to £250,000.

However the Coalition seems to love Gordon Brown's tinkering mantra of making things complicated to appease special interests rather than taking a common sense view.

The ludicrous wealth tax which I wrote about last week is another. People can't pay taxes out of illiquid investments, if you must tax them to pay for redistribution, then ask them to pay when they have the money - i.e. when they sell the property or die.  Put capital gains on own properties at say 10% or increase death duties. Thus money is payable when it is in cash form - not demanded when capital is tied up with no realised gains.

None of this is very hard, it requires a few minutes thinking time and yet the Government has hundreds of advisors at work. But it doesn't work a left wing Lib Dem party and confused Conservative party are unable to articulate simple ideas, we are left with the 'Big Society' and ill-defined NHS reforms - and, of course, tax rises to pay for all the confusion.

Where is the David Cameron from the video above - the one who saw the craziness of over-regulation and spotted the desire for people to create business and work more free from Government control? Instead of following its simplification agenda as promised, the Government is tied up with tax tinkering and trying to find new ways of raising money via some form of class war. New Labour's legacy of divide and rule lives on.